Thursday 8 October 2009

Making progress

We had an extra long weekend away down at the coast to check on progress of the house and just relax. Unfortunately, it rained most of the time, and was unseasonably cold - bloody freezing in fact. I felt sorry for all the campers - it is school holidays and there were lots of family groups - imagine being stuck inside a tent for days on end with restless children and nothing but rain, rain, rain - and very cold rain at that. Ugh, doesn't bear thinking about. I did get quite a bit of handsewing done on my octagon blocks, so all was not lost.

They have started cladding the house, although if we keep getting rain this month, as forecast, that will slow progress down. Our hopes of being in by Christmas were (gently) dashed by the builder - we might just squeak it, but we'd rather wait and move in with absolutely everything finished so we can just kick back and enjoy, not spend the first month rushing around finishing landscaping etc.

Sometime back I spied this fellow in a local gallery. He is the work of a local(ish) artist from Bermagui, Murray Ambler. I just love him. We always see pelicans on our walks and rides around the inlet. They hang around where the fishermen come in to clean their catch as they know they will get the fish carcasses. Here is the real thing doing an amazing balancing act.
We watched him glide in gracefully and make a perfect landing on this light. They are very big birds - our sculpture is life size and very heavy, given that it is made of recycled junk yard metal. I do rather like him though - we just have to decide where he is going to go exactly - in the meantime, the gallery is babysitting him for us. Although that caused a few problems as the weekend I bought him, the fact that he was sold didn't filter through to some of the other gallery staff and they promptly sold him to someone else. Fortunately, the artist kindly agreed to make another one for me, even though he is apparently 'over' doing pelicans and has moved on to other things.
We did have a couple of days - or parts of a couple of days when it stopped raining and the sun peeked out, although it was still cold. Here is Mt Dromadery - called Gulaga by the local aborigines - guarding Wagonga inlet - a pristine body of crystal clear water where oysters are grown.
This is looking north along the beaches of Kianga and Dalmeny. Can't wait until we are living there fulltime - can you blame me?!!

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